Tuesday, 7 May 2013

BLACK SMOCK, BLUE SMOCK?

There are a lot of hindsight moments in parenting. I’m sure
every mother and father out there is shaking his or her head in agreement on
that one. Even at the end of every day, it’s hard not to look back on one’s parental
scorecard and think to yourself, ‘man, I could’ve handled that one better.’ Or
conversely of course, ‘wow, I hit that one out of the park. I should write a
parenting book!’ (ha!) This hindsight applies to the minutiae of day to day
parenting (next time hide the magic marker when you leave the room) as well as
the very big issues...well, we’re not really at this point yet, but I’m sure his
teenage years will bring plenty to ruminate over (especially as yesterday the King drained the rest of my friend's beer without us knowing. Not a good sign).

At the moment (in hindsight) I’m realizing that the whole ‘Mommy’ moniker
was an egregious mistake on my part. I mean honestly, I’m a bright woman, how
did I get this one so wrong when the field was so wide open? In short, at the present
time, I hear the word ‘Mommy,’ about 1000 times a day from the King. I do not
jest. It is said all day, every day, in absurd repetition as if his motherboard
has a profound glitch in it. Followed by a very close second: ‘Mommy, LOOK!’ [I have a profound case of whiplash]. Now, if I had just put a little bit of thought into things, I could’ve
introduced myself to my son on day one as ‘Hot Stuff.’ Or ‘Do-er of all that is great and
intelligent with a very small bottom.’ Or, ‘Beautiful Genius that is always right.’ I mean the
possibilities, as I said, are limitless. So whilst I would have to listen to my
moniker at all times, at least it would be a flattering, life-affirming
acknowledgement of my stellar greatness :-). All you potential
parents out there should think long and hard about this one and choose your title wisely.

The other major hindsight moment I am having at the moment
is in regards to the King’s clothing. I used to hear it from my friends who
were mothering girls that getting them dressed in the morning was next to
impossible. They either wanted to wear princess dresses, dress like Beyonce (god help us) or it took 3 hours to
pick out their outfits so that they were perfectly color coordinated (or
clashed to perfection). I certainly never thought the King would be the kind of
kid to be picky about what he wore. But of course, at the moment, it takes us
about 45 minutes of negotiating in the morning to get clothes on his body. One
point of contention is that he wants to wear pajamas everywhere – if I end up
raising Hugh Hefner I will be very disheartened.

The other problem is that despite giving him a few choices
so that he can feel in control of his decisions (as the experts suggest) he
somehow finds a way to circumvent even that. At the moment, despite the fact
that we finally are seeing some amazing weather, he only wants to wear heavy
thick jumpers (sweaters for you Yanks). I can’t say I find this surprising, as
I’m sure he thought that by living in England, he was locked in a five year
Game of Thrones winter. So currently, I get him dressed after a 45-minute
summit meeting negotiated by the UN and then of course he furtively sneaks
upstairs, builds a tower of things enabling him to open the top dresser drawer
and pick out the heaviest jumper he can find. So my hindsight moment (and
advice to all you perspective parents out there) is perhaps to buy ten shirts
and pants in all the same color so that dressing himself seems downright boring. Or hell, I’ll just buy a uniform that
resembles an airline steward and make him think that this is what everyone wears. I’m thinking the Amish do not have this dressing problem in their
households. Blue smock, black smock. Voila, done!

You see, hindsight, clearly 20/20...although, if hindsight
was foolproof, we’d eventually get everything right, would we not? Then again,
I think that by screwing up on a weekly basis, I’m merely proving to the King –
like any good model parent - that parenting is like life, learn from your
mistakes and never kid yourself that you’ve got it all figured out.